Right or wrong?
 

O.K., I am fairly new to officiating, but I have a question.

I watched a boys high school play off game the other day and it was 3 man.

There were several times when one of the 3 officials seemed to "take over" the game.

On one play, players were scrambling for the ball 4 or 5 players after the ball together in a bunch. Two of the officials called Jumpball, He comes running in from the trail position and calls a foul on the play.

On another play, he again is the trail official easily 25 or more feet away from the play in the lane. Lead and center neither have a call, he comes in from nearly half court and yelling he has the foul, he has the foul. No one anywhere near the play had anything.

Both of these plays were against the same team. He seemed to be drawing attention to himself. He was the elder of the 3 man group, but not the R. There was a third play where he called an intentional foul, maybe it was or maybe it wasn't, contact was minimal. The basket was good, as were the two free throws and the team inbounded the ball and made another 2 points...a six point turn around on 1 play.

My question here as a newbie, doen't it seem like he is drawing attention to himself as an official? Shouldn't we be trying to avoid draw the attention. On two of these plays, he was calling out of his area. The crowd booed him several times. Including when he left the floor at half time and when he arrived back to start the 3rd quarter.

Generally yes you should stay in your area ( members here will argue how much so) No we should never intentionally try to draw attention to ourselves, however that being said as officials we are in the limelight and thats just how it is. If the events happened as you say they did I think this guy had a bad halftime. He was obviously booed off the court, then probably chewed out by his fellow two officials during halftime, and then again obviously booed. With two other officials who are experienced ( they were working a state toury they are pretty good) I would see no reason for this official to make the calls he made. Seems like he made that game a disaster for that crew. O well it goes that way sometimes.

Sounds like over officaiting to me.

Without seeing it, it's impossible to say. If the play originated from his area as trail, he should take it all the way to the basket.

When you observe other officials, you can pick up things you want to incorporate into you game, and things you definitely don't want to do. Hopefully you classify his actions in the appropriate category.

Mregor

A fellow official of mine always used to say this about going out of your primary:

"If I see something, there's no whistle, and I go "oh sh*t", I'll let it go. If I see something, there's no whistle, and I go "oh f**k", I'm gonna go get it."

I tend to think that in a HS playoff game anywhere, with a 3-person crew, the chance of three "oh f**k" situations is very low.

Without judging this particular elder official, I will only say that my experience has been that a number of older officials who worked 2-man for many years have had a difficult time adjusting to the court coverage areas and philosophy of the 3-man officiating system.

Add To Pregame ????
 

From canuckrefguy: "If I see something, there's no whistle, and I go "oh sh*t", I'll let it go. If I see something, there's no whistle, and I go "oh f**k", I'm gonna go get it."

canuckrefguy: If you don't mind, I would like to add this to my pregame conference list. Previously, I used to say, "Stay in your primary. Respect each other's area. Seldom should have four eyes on the ball. It must be obvious to come out of your primary. We’re not going to have too many double whistles if we are doing this right." I like your friends way better, its shorter and straight to the point.

I'm confused. How do you pronounce *? Is this some Canadian thing, eh? :confused:

Fans will cheer; fans will boo; fans will make stupid comments to other fans. It's what fans do. Don't let fan reaction influence your evaluation of another official's work. For that matter, don't let it influence your work either.

I was cut from Canada's sarcasm team.
 

That's right. In Canada, when you see a * in the middle of a word, you make any vowel sound you want, in a high-pitched tone. Kind of like you're beeping yourself out.

Groan.

Eh.